Proud Geek

Got a hankering to know just exactly what time it is, whereever you are? Wanting to synchronize time with your pals but can’t decide whose watch / smartphone has exactly the correct time?

Go pay time.gov a visit on your mobile device / smartphone / pager.

But what’s that? Time.gov’s Java-enabled functions doesn’t work on your smartphone? (These Java pages make it possible to see the time in real time on computers and Java-enabled phones - with the seconds running.) Don’t fret. Almost buried in a corner of many time.gov pages is a tiny link saying “Disable Java Animation” — clicking on this link allows you to see a non-Java version of that page. In fact, when you find your time zone and then get the non-Java version of that page, don’t forget to bookmark it on your smartphone’s web browser so you can quickly refer to it again. But keep in mind that, unlike Java versions of these pages, non-Java time.gov pages only show the time at the exact time the page was loaded onto your browser - that is, the time isn’t updated automatically unless you refresh the page.

I know many smartphones - including the Palm Treos - can automatically get the time and date from the network. But leaving this functionality on can be a huge power drain for the Palm Treos (and possibly other devices) - so that’s where having a bookmark to time.gov can come in handy if you leave this functionality off.

I’ll make it easy for you. Here’s a list of links to the non-Java pages of the various USA time zones. Gosh, ain’t it interesting how many time zones there really are in the USA and its territories? And remember when Alaska’s number of time zones changed from the previous four to just two now?

Happy times are indeed here! (And yes, I had previously blogged about checking time.gov from your computer.)

List of non-Java versions of time.gov time zone webpages:

• Atlantic time zone
• Eastern time zone
  
• Central time zone
• Mountain time zone
  
• Mountain time zone (Arizona, non-Navajo, no Daylight Saving)
• Pacific time zone
• Alaska time zone
• Hawaii / Aleutian time zone (Aleutian Islands, no Daylight Saving)
• Hawaii / Aleutian time zone
• Samoa and Midway time zone
• Marshall and Wake Islands time zone
• Kwajalein Island time zone
• Federated Islands of Micronesia (Caroline) time zone
• Chamorro time zone
• Palau time zone